by Elle Ray | Oct 1, 2014 | Office
All Blog Writers Get Inspired in a Creative Space
As professional blog writers, we continually need to create fresh new copy. If our bonnets buzz with busy bees looking to sting our creative ability out of existence, we’re in trouble. We have to come up with new ideas every week for our clients — it’s what makes them stand out from a crowded marketplace.
Feng shui aside (that’s another blog topic), how you decorate your office or primary workplace can illuminate your creative spirit — or conversely damper your efforts at generating fresh ideas.
Try these tips to increase blood flow to your brain and boost your creative energy:
- Color Counts: Paint your office (all four walls or just one wall in your main work area) or decorate with colorful accessories to stimulate creativity.
- Pale Blue: You see pale blue in many schools because it’s known to have powers of creative stimulation. It’s also very calming, which can help you focus. Furthermore, believe or not, it’s an appetite suppressant — an added bonus when you’re dieting or just trying to work past lunchtime.
- Earthy Orange: Orange is a blood stimulator that increases sexual energy and brain power; when the two mental activities merge, blog writers, graphic artists and project developers get plenty creative. Orange also energizes and puts you in the mood to accomplish great things.
- Bright Yellow: When added in small touches, yellow boosts creativity, activates your memory recall and helps you concentrate. While dark yellows can cut off your creative juices, bright colors used as accent pieces give just the right incentive for new ideas.
- Helpful Reminders: Success breeds success and creative success breeds the same. Surround yourself with reminders that you are creative.
- All around your office, post pictures and copies of past campaigns or closings that make you particularly proud to remind you that you have what it takes.
- Decorate your office bulletin board with testimonials from clients and pictures of celebrations.
- Make a copy of your first check from your business and hang it up. It’s a ploy that’s been used in restaurants for years to remind owners how far they’ve come. The boost in confidence will boost your creativity and help to dispel doubt.
- Promote Collaboration: Oftentimes, the best bouts of creativity are sparked in brainstorming sessions with friend or partner. One person’s ideas spur the creative juices in another, leading you both to greater creative heights. Blog writers and project teams are particularly in need of brainstorming time and space.
- Create open spaces in your office where employees automatically run into each other on a regular basis.
- Make the break area clean, inviting and full with coffee machines, bowls of candy, flowers and snacks so that workers want to spend time there and are comfortable sitting around.
- Place meeting rooms and break rooms in places that allow plenty of outside light to enter the space. Light spurs creative juices and the outside scenery also serves as a kick-start to ideas, whether you’re looking at nature for ideas for blog writers or out on a busy street for fresh people perspectives.
Blog writers need inspiration and creativity. Blog writers need ideas. Even if you’re a lone writer, you can still help yourself be more creative. Here at Ray Access, we take creativity seriously. We depend on it, and our clients depend on us.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Sep 11, 2014 | Writing
We Have to Sit at the Computer During Summer
Ray Access is a content provider and content marketing business. That means we are writers and editors. In order to earn our income, we write. On a computer. At a desk. Inside an office. Regardless of the weather, the day of the week or even the time of day.
Fortunately, both Linda and Mark work at desks in rooms with windows that look out onto views with lots of green. We can see the sun shine and the clouds roll in and the rain begin. We can see the world pass by. Then it’s back to work.
Trapped in a Job?
That makes it sound as if we were chained to our desks, but the truth is far from that. We take frequent breaks. We stretch. We stroll around the room while thinking how best to help our clients. We do what we need to do to keep our bodies healthy and our minds sharp. Because we are writers, we get paid to write. If we’re not writing, we’re not making money.
So Linda and Mark of Ray Access have developed a term for the time we’re working. OK, actually, it was Linda who came up with the term, but now we both use it. It’s “B.I.C.” or “Butt In Chair.” If we don’t have our butts in the desk chairs, we’re not working. In other words, work starts when butt meets chair.
We All Sacrifice
Some people have to rise early to commute to a factory job where all the windows are 30 feet above them. Others drive around all day, stuck behind a wheel. Still others toil under the hot sun attaching shingles to wooden frames. Everyone has something to do for the job. Working — earning money to put food on the table — often entails some form of sacrifice.
So that’s how it is for us. Even on a gorgeous day, we’re usually inside typing away on a keyboard. Is it Saturday? Sunday? It doesn’t matter; you can still reach us on our cell phones, because we’re often still at our desks. Now that it’s September, we look up and realize summer has passed us by. It’s one of the occupational hazards of writing for a living.
Writing Is Our Passion
But it’s not that much of a sacrifice for us because writing is what we love to do. This blog post is evidence, since we don’t get paid for writing for our own blog. We do it out of love.
We like to think we’re adding value to our website by educating our readers about our business. But like most dedicated writers, we’d do it even if no one read our words. We’re writers; we have to write.
And that’s why we’re so perfectly poised to help your business. Because we love to write, because we’re so good at it after years of practice, we are the best options to rewrite your website, to create content for your business blog and to turn your company newsletter from a ho-hum read to a compelling one. Discover the difference professional writers can make to your business. Act now, you get not one, but two writers working for you, all for the same price!
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Aug 28, 2014 | Small Business Advice
Why the Distinction Matters in Your Business
Are you a lark or a night owl? Do you get your best work done before noon or after five? Whichever answer you give, you may not have much say in the matter and may in fact become more productive and happy with your work if you just go ahead and honor your circadian rhythm.
There’s no reason to disrespect co-workers and business partners who happen to land on the opposite side of the spectrum. There’s new evidence that much of our energy preferences actually are programmed in our genes, creating actual physical differences in brain structure between morning and night people.
Add Lifestyle to the Mix
Studies by German scientists in 2013 found that people who stayed up late and slept in later than their counterparts had less white, fatty tissue in their brains. The white matter is associated with communication and links certain nerve cells together. Reduced white matter also is associated with depression and anxiety.
When you follow your genetic desire to stay up late and sleep in late, you often find yourself at odds with the rest of the working world, which then exacerbates the alienation that often leads to depression. You may find yourself sleep-deprived on a regular basis as you try to maintain a “normal” schedule to fit in with society’s expectations. Night owls also have a tendency to eat, drink and smoke more than naturally early risers.
Good News for Night Owls
But this kind of lifestyle also has its upsides. The chronically jet-lagged set also tends to be much more productive and energetic than their counterparts who get to bed early and rise with the sun. You usually have more stamina during your waking hours and end up getting more done. It’s very often the night owls in a business who drive the ultimate success of a company.
Night owls also tend to be more analytical, making it easier for them to see the big picture and figure the ways and means to achieve objectives. Their reasoning skills often are far superior to the early risers. The trick is to balance and fine-tune those extra advantages so they don’t get lost in the mood swings more common among night owls.
Nurture Over Nature
Just as the discussion rages on about nature over nurture when it comes to child-rearing, the conversation also is relevant to business people struggling with the natural biological pull of an internal alarm clock. To avoid the mood swings, anxiety and depression commonly associated with people who work best at night, you can regulate your sleep habits consciously.
Night owls hoping to make those early breakfast meetings and avoid all-nighters can rely on mechanical alarm clocks set on a regular basis. Avoid alcohol before going to bed and artificial light when it’s dark outside to make it easier to stick to a regular sleep cycle. When you control your sleep patterns, you won’t experience the manic highs you may enjoy in the middle of the night, but you will be much more even-tempered and easy-going like your early bird friends and co-workers.
For night owls, it’s a trade-off. For early birds, it’s a blessing. Which time of the day do you work best?
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Aug 18, 2014 | Office
Carpal Tunnel Can Strike All of Us… Even You
For nearly 20 years, I owned a business that relied heavily on my two hands. I cleaned and reconditioned boats. Waxing and scrubbing, holding vibrating sanders, mops, buckets and rags and climbing all over 25-to-65-foot motor yachts and sailboats. It was exhausting. Eventually, I could barely open my hands. If I didn’t stop, carpal tunnel and arthritis would leave me with constant pain and little use in my hands.
I had to quit that business. I wasn’t going to become crippled for any amount of money.
Advice from a Keyboard Junkie
Now I sit at a computer for hours on end, hands poised on the keyboard and fingers moving very little as they fly over the keys. Some days, my hands ache. But I’m doing everything I can to prevent carpal tunnel syndrome from developing. Because of the research I’ve done and the steps I follow, the pain never lingers. So if you find yourself in a similar situation, take my advice and take these steps, which are based on thorough, reliable research:
- I set up my desk and work station to conform to my body’s needs. My chair is adjustable, with movable arm rests so I can change the angle at which my hands reach the keyboard and change up the pressure points. Some days my elbows rest on the armrests, other days they hang free and I rest my wrists on the wrist-rest attached to my keyboard.
- I use an ergonomic keyboard that’s split so that my fingers hit the keys in a very natural position. The keyboard tray is low because I’m short. It pulls out from below my desk. Everything about my arms and hands feels natural, even when I’m working the mouse, which I use constantly while researching. My mouse pad has a nice, cushy wrist support too.
- I type with easy taps. I make sure my keys are loose and respond instantly to a light touch. The Mayo Clinic reports that striking keys with force creates additional, unnecessary pressure that, over time, can lead to carpal tunnel syndrome.
- I take a lot of breaks. At least once every hour, I get up from my desk and get a glass of water, walk around the office, check the mail or go to the bathroom. While up, I stretch my fingers and my wrists. I move them to work out any kinks. Making a fist and opening my hands wide four or five times does wonders. When short breaks don’t relieve any beginning signs of pain, I do something different, like make phone calls, read or write to-do lists with pen and paper.
- I pay attention to my posture and straighten my spine when I start hunching over. When your neck and shoulders slump forward, that cuts off the nerves that feed fresh blood down your arms to your hands. It helps that we have a spine specialist and a pain management practice as clients, because I’m constantly reminded of the importance of proper posture.
About Carpal Tunnel Syndrome
The main cause of carpal tunnel syndrome, a condition that causes hand and arm numbness and tingling, is pinched nerves. Weakness and the inability to hold objects is another symptom that could signal the onset of the condition. Treatment may consist of:
- Wrist splints
- NSAIDs (non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs), like ibuprofen
- Steroid injections
- Ultrasound therapy
- Physical or occupational therapy
- Endoscopic or open surgery
But the best treatment for carpal tunnel is prevention. After a lifetime, my favorite jobs — those that I’m good at and give me the most pleasure — involve my hands. So I want to take care of them. As a professional writer, it behooves me to follow my own advice, something I’m not always ready to do. As one of the partners at Ray Access, I both want and need to take care of my hands. They are the tools from which my creativity and my soul flow through.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Aug 5, 2014 | Small Business Advice
Networking Advice for Business Owners
Image courtesy of Ambro / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Networking is one of the most powerful means at your disposal to market and grow your small company. Yet so many business people fear the crowded rooms. But be assured that not everyone sipping wine and trading business cards is comfortable. Like you, many had to swallow their fears, take a deep breath and dive forward to press the flesh. The alternative, they know, is sitting in silence in a dark corner as all their hard work slowly comes to naught.
The bottom line is that it’s not about who you know, but who knows you. To earn a reputation in your field and in your market, you have to be visible. People have to know your name and be able to put a face to it. Business people drop names as part of their normal, everyday pitch, and they only drop names of experts they’ve met in person or heard a great deal about. To be that person and get that referral, you’ve got to hit the networking circuit in your area and within your industry.
Succeed at Networking
To help you make the most out of those after-hour mixers, breakfast pow-wows and open house handshakes, we’ve put together a list of tips. Try them — and tell others where you heard about them — because the writers and editors at Ray Access know the power of networking:
- Compliment people. Remember that business men and women are just people. Who doesn’t appreciate a compliment about a pair of shoes, a jacket, tie or handbag? A compliment is a great way to start a conversation — and perhaps a new relationship.
- Approach loners. You can find them standing in the corner or nursing a drink at the bar. Loners sometimes can feel less threatening than approaching a pack of pristine suits who are standing in a circle laughing at an in-joke. Instead, commiserate with the fellow loner about how much you deplore these events to find common ground.
- Ask questions. As former journalists, we always resort to the time-honored trick of getting people to talk about themselves as a way to open up a conversation. Even inane questions like: “What do you do?” or “How about them Red Sox?” can serve as an opener leading to and interesting (and profitable) conversation. You never know.
- Move around. One mistake networking newbies often make is to stick with one group of people they’ve become comfortable with. Once you make a quick connection, trade cards and leave an impression, move along. The purpose of networking is to talk to as many people as possible in the time allotted. Get busy!
- Go alone. Business people who move in packs don’t take the chance to break away and meet someone new. A networking event is not the place to socialize with people you already know, even if it’s nice to acknowledge each other. The primary goal is to see and be seen by all the people you don’t know.
- Leave the sale for later. Pushy business people who only talk about themselves often end up alone. Salespeople who try to sell their services to everyone they meet tend to earn negative reputations. In fact, if you rarely talk about yourself, you’ll be remembered because you listened. Wouldn’t you rather be remembered positively and not with a knowing eye roll?
So don’t fear. You too have what it takes to get out there and develop new relationships. All it takes is a deep breath and a stack of business cards.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Jul 21, 2014 | Blog Writing
Ideas for Your Blog Can Come from Anywhere
By now, most investors know that you get the biggest bang — and lessen the overall risk — by investing your money in diversified funds. The old adage of “don’t put all your eggs in one basket” is true in many arenas, including the blogosphere.
The more authoritative your articles, the better, of course, but the more people you can reach, the better your chance of becoming recognized as the go-to expert in your field. To that end, we at Ray Access are taking our own advice and beginning to diversify our blog topics.
Writers Write
We are first and foremost writers. And we tout our uniqueness by also wearing editors’ hats with every post, blog, webpage and press release we create. As professional writers, we believe that no writing should ever be published that isn’t first read by another set of eyes, preferably a professional editor with a keen sense of tone, voice, grammar, style and sass.
Because that’s our strength, we’ve been devoting our informational blogs to the art and science of writing online — and getting your writing read by the right people. At least up to this point. As we continue to share our expertise through this blog, we now will begin diversifying to bring you articles and insights we believe important and interesting to all business people, including bloggers.
Mix It Up
In addition to writing about writing for the web, with topics like “why you need an image on your blog” and “what plagiarism does to your page rankings,” we’ll mix it up with articles about networking, health, decorating and fashion. With this new mix, we hope to give you interesting and informative topics to share with your friends and colleagues, to post on your own social sites and to raise your awareness.
You’re going to see us more frequently online too, as we deliver the fresh, insightful thoughts that are making us famous (or infamous, depending on your perspective). Our goal is to make the Ray Access blog a must-read for anyone who ever writes a post, reads a webpage or trolls the Internet for fun or profit — in a nutshell, nearly everyone.
Off the Path
OK, we admit that we’re being a tad shameless with this new direction that we’re taking our blog. But we want to increase our own visibility, too. The more informative, unique and important our blogs are, the more traffic we’re going to generate. We want our website to increase its online presence as our business grows. And it is growing.
We tell our clients that the more they post, the more they will increase traffic to their site. We want to lead by example. So don’t be surprised if you start reading articles related to a season, holiday or special event. Asheville, North Carolina, constantly presents us with interesting twists of the news. Maybe we’ll cover those too. We might even pop in an opinion or two. At the same time, you can expect more information about the art of writing for the web and all that it entails.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Jul 6, 2014 | Asheville
Another Reason to Live in Asheville, NC
Asheville entices retirees and dreamers to move here. The city — known as either a “Cesspool of Sin” or as a bastion of liberal politics, depending on your point of view — offers a bustling beer scene and enough gourmet restaurants to satisfy most foodies. In other words, there are many reasons to move here.
Bring Your Job
But the region’s high-technology community is in its infant phase. The economy relies heavily on tourism, health care and construction. Normal office jobs are scarce. You must bring a nest egg with you to tide you over until you figure out how to make it here. Alternatively, you must already have a job that doesn’t rely on the local economy.
If you come to Asheville expecting to find the perfect job, you may be disappointed. We personally know several people who have come here, stayed a while, and then left to find a more lucrative location. Because not only are the jobs not plentiful, the pay scale is less than in other markets.
Outside of Work
There are benefits to living here, though. The scenery is breathtaking. The nearby mountains bestow feelings of peace and fulfillment. Even if you don’t like hiking, river sports (including river tubing) or ziplining, Asheville has a lot to offer.
The downtown scene jumps and hops during the summer months. The bars, restaurants and pubs do a brisk business. The sidewalks crowd with young, old and everyone in between. Asheville is a vibrant, fun small city.
Where Creativity Never Ends
We live and work here, and as long as we’ve been in Asheville, we have not suffered writer’s block. We’re not sure if it’s the mountains, the people, the trees, the architecture, the air or the food, but we never lack ideas. We never lack inspiration. Whenever we sit down to write, we always have the words.
Asheville is a place where creativity seems to appear whenever we need it, as if by magic. We can’t explain it, but neither can we deny it. Asheville supplies us with what we need to create. The place makes working joyful, fruitful and nearly effortless.
Let Us Show You
As a result, we create quality content for our clients. Due to where we choose to live and work (at least partially), our work is always on time and on budget. Our clients appreciate not only the timeliness of our work, but also the effectiveness of our words.
Let us show you what we can do for you. Check out our portfolio to see what we’ve done for other clients. Then contact us about your needs. We can solve your website, blogging and online marketing issues. If you let us.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | Jun 10, 2014 | Writing
How to Write Effectively in the 21st Century
Today’s Shakespeares look harder at page rankings and reader conversion numbers than at what’s actually on the page. But those days are fast coming to a close. Search engines have been tweaked to recognize the keyword-stuffed, quick-hit advert-articles that have plagued the Web for years. Now they are seeking — nay, demanding — that you put consistent, meaningful quality content on your website or just go home.
The Long or Short of It
The average visitor to a website leaves within 10 to 20 seconds — but that assumes there is obviously nothing of value on the page. Research now shows that if you can capture the attention of readers within those first important seconds, you can keep them there for much longer. And the longer the visit, the more likely you’ll make a sale.
The days of needing to keep blogs, Web pages and articles short to hold readers’ attention are gone. Born again is the prospect of enticing readers to continue reading, to find value in your writing and to stay — and even scroll — to finish your piece. According to researchers at Microsoft, the length of your copy is not as important as the first few lines of copy you offer. So whether you write 250 words or 2,500 words, if you don’t capture readers’ attention in the first couple lines, they’re out of there. Click.
Search Engines Like Quality
Now, attracting readers in the first place is another story. The top 10 listings on Google for a sample keyword search each had more than 2,000 words on their landing pages. The sites aren’t ranked high just because they have a lot of copy; they receive the top spots because they have a lot of rich copy — words that convey a useful message, a message that readers want to read and can’t stop reading. Websites that provide more of what readers want are getting the most respect from search engines.
The adage that’s been working its way through the Web-marketing world the last few years is: “Copy is king.” It seems now that copy is king, queen, jack and the entire court.
Readers Like Quality
Readers prefer rich copy, too. They are more willing to re-post blogs with longer, useful content than shorter, unappealing copy. Quick Sprout analyzed 327 blog posts and found that posts with more than 1,500 words received 22.6 percent more likes on Facebook and 68.1 percent more tweets than shorter articles.
One phenomena linked to these findings is that people are searching for more complex terms than ever before, using up to eight words in a search — which by the way is called a “long tail.” With more copy, you increase the odds that you’ll fit those searches. When they find you, the odds also increase that readers will convert to customers too.
So when asked whether it’s better to write more or less, the answer today is: “More is better!” Richer is better and more is better. But when you’ve got to have it all done right, more rich content is something that we at Ray Access can do too.
Ray Access Today
We’ve bought into the traditional rap that blogs need to be fewer than 500 words to be effective. But we’re retuning our concepts to align with the Google monster that rules so much of what occurs on the Web. Expect to see longer blogs from us occasionally. It’s still time-consuming, and we’ll have to charge more for longer blogs, but with the right combination of length and quality, we expect to get better results, just as you will.
We can’t just throw up some nonsense blog or give you just a quick peek at a really hot new trend. We’ve got to give you reasons and research, reality and really rich rewards if we expect you to stay. And if we expect you to convert and call us, we better give you something worth your while. Let us know. Did we?
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
by Elle Ray | May 27, 2014 | Blog Writing
And Why Current Events Should Matter to You
One of the most common — and most effective — ways to get consistent hits on your blog is to tie some of your topics to current events. When people are searching the web for information about a plane crash, an epidemic or a recent celebrity wedding, there’s a good chance that your newly posted, well-written blog may come up in the search. And after all, your blog should be attracting new visitors to your website.
Image courtesy of Gualberto107 / FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Stay on Top of the News
To begin, you’ve got to stay tuned to the news of the day. You can’t expect to keep up-to-date on current events if you’re not a regular news reader. And that means all sections of the news cycle, from entertainment to world news, local happenings and celebrity gossip.
Get in the habit of scanning the headlines of a thorough daily news website that covers all the main topics of the day. Watch for a tie-in to your industry or geographic area. Then write a blog post that either answers questions that were raised or mentions your area of expertise.
Use Newsworthy Keywords
To get a search engine’s attention, you need to incorporate keywords that people may be searching for. If you’re writing about food poisoning to tie in with the latest cruise line outbreak, for example, include keywords such as “cruise line outbreak,” or “food poisoning on cruises.” If you’re blogging about allergies, tie into the spring allergy reports in the news with slogans commonly used.
If your tie-in is local, make sure to include the area as it’s referred to in the news. For example, a landslide in Western North Carolina may effect your area of Asheville, but the news keeps referring to the “WNC landslide.” Be sure to include the words “WNC landslide,” even if your blog is about how to prevent mold after flooding in the city of Asheville.
Write and Post Quickly
Just as quickly as news occurs and is reported, the media is on to the next big disaster or celebrity misbehavior. When you’re tapping into current events for your blog topics, make sure they really are timely. Attaching your name to the fires in California won’t be as effective a week after they’ve been extinguished. Nor will your blog post about how to communicate in a marriage hold as much search engine strength a month after a big celebrity divorce as it might when the famous couple first has a shouting match in public.
When you see news that you could tie into your own business, write the blog post that same day or contact Ray Access to quickly knock out a relevant article that provides unique content with a current event twist. Post it within 24 hours of the news reporting cycle to get the most from the tie-in.
Ray Access is a content marketing firm that delivers targeted words to empower your business. Contact us about your specific project to receive a quote or discuss your needs. We write website copy, blog posts, e-newsletters and more. Everything we do is thoroughly researched, professionally edited and guaranteed original.
